Emanuel Azenberg on How to Succeed on Broadway

Longtime Broadway producer Emanuel “Manny” Azenberg spent most of his life avoiding the spotlight. He raised money, assuaged egos, put out fires – all behind the scenes.

He’ll reluctantly take the stage, however, at this Sunday’s Tony Awards when he’s honored for his work on more than 70 Broadway productions with a “Special Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre.”

Holding court at his usual table in the Polish Tea Room on 47th Street, he says being recognized is nice, but it doesn’t necessarily bring out his best side.

“You have to be gracious. It’s not that I’m rude, it’s just that I really don’t deal well with praise,” he says. “But it’s a wonderful acknowledgement.”

There have been surprising perks, though – like finding out that people actually liked working with him. At a recent Tony Awards luncheon, he says, he ran into folks he collaborated with over the years. “Stockard Channing, James Earl Jones, Linda Lavin . . . and they gave me genuine affection. Producers don’t get affection. Very often producers behave badly, and I suppose I behaved that way, too. But the affection was genuine, and that was nice.”

The Wall Street Journal spoke to Azenberg, 78, over chicken noodle soup and egg sandwiches. Following is an edited transcript:

When you were producing plays, you were often the only producer. Nowthere are33 people listed on the Playbill as “producers.” What do you think about that?

There’s the cosmetic nightmare that it looks stupid, and it diminishes whatever function the actual producer might have because it’s shared with 33 people. They’re not “producers” in any practical way. Thirty-two of the people don’t talk to the director. Or maybe they talk, but they’re disregarded. But raising money has become more difficult. A Neil Simon play cost $300,000. Now it’s four million.

I don’t think that people are invested as an quote-unquote investment. I think they’re going to the track culturally, or semi-culturally, or whatever Broadway is now. Being a producer is somewhere between being a patron of the arts and having a need for recognition. Because if your name is on the Playbill with 33 people, you can walk around at a cocktail party and say, “Yes, I’m a producer of ‘The Book of Mormon.’”

Why can’t they just be listed as investors then?

Why are you being rational?

How did you get your start in theater?

My uncle was an actor in the Yiddish theater and he worked on Broadway. My sister and I would come down from The Bronx and go to the theater. It cost $1.20. I saw John Garfield in “Skipper Next to God.” He was a big star, a movie star, and he was Jewish. His real name was Garfinkle. So the idea that there was a street guy that came from the neighborhoods who was a star was a big thing. He was like Brando to us.

I went into the army and when I came out I was 25 and I thought, “Well, now I know what work is and I don’t want to do that.” I thought, “I’ll get a job in the theater. That’s not work.” So I got a job on a show in 1959 called “The Legend of Lizzie” for $60 a week. It ran two nights.

But soon you were back.

I was diligent, but not ambitious. I wanted to be a company manager. So I got a job in the summer in the theater, and then a job off-Broadway, and then ultimately I got hired by David Merrick. We did two dozen shows in three-and-a-half years. I learned what I needed to learn.

How did you hook up with Neil Simon?

I was the company manager for David Merrick for a show called “Sunday in New York” in which [Robert] Redford was a player. He wasn’t a star. He got $300 a week and I got $225. And when he came back to New York in “Barefoot in the Park” he called up and said, you have to play on this softball team. Neil was second base.

How did you start working together?

I didn’t produce his plays until eight years later. We were quietly friendly, though. I was going about my business, and then – 43 years ago last weekend — Neil called up and said, “Would you come over to the house?” And I walked in the door and he just looked at me and said, ‘How would you like to produce my plays?’ And being funny, I said, “I don’t know, let me think about it.” And he threw a script at me and said, “Read this and let me know what you think.” It was “The Sunshine Boys.” And we stayed together for 35 years.

He’s said you were always honest with him, which is why you worked so well together.

There are euphemisms to help you get along with people. You don’t have to say, “I think this play is s—.” You just say, “Well, let’s have a reading” and Neil would know I had some doubt. The ones I liked, I said, “Let’s do it.”

There was one play where I said no. I really said, “We’re not going to do it.” But he kept taking it out of the drawer, so I said, “Okay, well do it. We’ll exorcise it so you can get rid of this play.” And then that play opened and failed. It was called “God’s Favorite.” And the next one was a hit, “California Suite,” and “God’s Favorite” was forgotten. Neil was a totally intuitive writer. He didn’t dwell. On to the next.

How did you work with Tom Stoppard?

Out of terror.His stuff was difficult. It’s not nearly as accessible. Stoppard sat in the back of the theater and you didn’t want him to ask your opinion because you’d actually have to have one. You deal with artists and playwrights differently, and if there’s anything to producing, it’s that intuition of knowing who you are dealing with.

You seem really sane for a so-called theater person.

I have five kids. Five kids and a decent marriage for a long time and my kids are not rotten and they’re not entitled and they’re not on drugs. I’ve had a pretty balanced life. I don’t have any regrets or great frustrations. I have petty envy. But I can contain it. I would have liked to produce [the new] “Death of a Salesman.” But the truth is, I had a pretty good time.

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